Thursday, July 05, 2007

The Creepshow series was originally written by Stephen King and directed by George Romero, however by this 2006 incarnation both horror maestros had ceased to be involved, and both directorial and writing credits went to Ana Clavell and James Glenn Dudelson.

The film has attracted much criticism and I think a little unfairly, okay it is a little bit like a gory version of Goosebumps (which in itself should draw some criticism as the filmmakers certainly don’t know what is necessary to draw in the adult audience they were aiming for) but there are some interesting ideas floating around, even if they don’t necessarily work too well. There is also a vampire section.

Now normally, in these multi-story films I will review the vampire section but, to be honest, this one is so short that I didn’t feel it warranted a review. Anyway, before we get to that there was a cartoon beginning and two other stories. I just want to mention the cartoon.

It, like the film generally, has been criticised but it really got my attention, it was very stylised but the colouring and animation form was so unusual that it drew me into the film as a whole. The other thing to note is that there is no underlying wraparound story here, but I’ll explain what they did later.

Getting to the vampire story we begin with orgasmic sounds and a woman, Rachael (Camille Lacey) walking out of an apartment, she holds a knife. On leaving the place she is shouted at by an irate pimp and, then, accosted by a bag lady talking religious redemption.

She is phoned by Victor (Ryan Carty), a college boy looking for companionship, as she is an escort. The bag lady continues her rant as she is on the phone and so Rachael stabs her, and then calmly finishes the conversation – agreeing to meet him – and gets in her car.

On the radio the news is talking about a serial killer, whom the police believe is a woman, who has killed ten so far. They call her the Call Girl Killer. Of course it is Rachael.

She gets to Victor’s and after a quick flirt with a couple of guys on the street she goes to his home. They banter a little and she points out that he is not in any of the photos. It is because, he lies, he is the black sheep and quickly hurries her upstairs. The camera pulls around and we see the family trussed up, dead and with neck wounds.

Victor pays her $1000 and asks to be tied up and blindfolded. This, of course, makes her job so much easier and she scores a blade along his torso before viciously stabbing him repeatedly. Job done she gets a shower.

After the shower she starts hearing a voice whispering her name. Going back to the bedroom it appears Victor is still dead. She lifts the cushion she placed on his face and his vampiric face is revealed. Now, to be fair, the effect is absolutely rubbish – way too cgi. But there you have it.

Anyway, he gets Rachael and bites her. The next day he leaves, so vampires in this can go out in the sun, and she is trussed up with the family and that, as they say, is that… ish, which I’ll get to in a minute. As you can see, however, there isn’t much story to this and less characterisation. The segment could have done with a lot more characterisation at least.

I said ish because films like this normally have a wraparound story linking the segments. This doesn’t but scenes and characters from one story appear in another, which was a neat idea. The stories are none linear, but there are still glaring chronological mistakes (unless we are talking different dimensions, a possibility given the first story).

The pimp and building in the vampire tale appear in the second tale. The flirting with the guys on the street by Rachael is repeated in story number four which then follows the two guys. In the last story we see the vampire again, in an underground scene he runs, we see him find Rachael’s card – thus why he chose her – and we also see a group of other vampires using the scene as a feeding ground, for all of 10 seconds with no attacks, just a lot of teeth.

So an honourable mention for this and a wish that they had done much more with Rachael and Victor’s story as they were potentially interesting characters who were left to flounder as less than two dimensional cut outs.

Welcome to my Vampire blog

Here you will find views and reviews of vampire genre media, from literature, the web, TV and the movies.

Please note that, by the very nature of the subject matter, my blogs are designed for the mature reader

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